<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>ive been sleepwalking since i was fourteen by hivesystem</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/30039279">ive been sleepwalking since i was fourteen</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/hivesystem/pseuds/hivesystem'>hivesystem</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>DreamSMP, Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Abuse, Alternate Universe - Gods &amp; Goddesses, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Evil TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Evil Wilbur Soot, Magic, Manipulation, edit: AY WE GOT WILBUR, evil tommy my beloved, he gets manipulated into breaking dream out and fucking shit up, i changed the name bc i wanted that name to be a chapter title, please ignore the plot hole of how tommy breaks dream out idk how pandora’s vault works, sam is also there but minorly, theyr all so evil and so lovely, this may become multi-chaptered?? if i want to make ppl suffer more, title from nine by sleeping at last</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-03-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-04-14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-16 01:14:53</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,353</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/30039279</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/hivesystem/pseuds/hivesystem</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>tommy is in prison. </p><p>dream is with him. </p><p>wilbur is dead. </p><p>and in a matter of days, that is all changed. </p><p>everything is changed.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Clay | Dream &amp; Wilbur Soot &amp; TommyInnit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>80</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. they don’t love you like i do.</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>title from love taste by moe shop</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>a security measure, sam told him. a security measure. it’d be over in a week. just a week. </p><p>just a week.</p><p>just a week. </p><p>trapped with dream. you know, dream. the guy who helped wilbur blow up l’manberg and led him to exile and hurt him and everyone he loves over and over and over. </p><p>all behind the smiling mask. </p><p>and now, he’s trapped, powerless, utterly powerless, with the person who he never wanted to see again. </p><p>it was supposed to be the last time. it was supposed to be CLOSURE. </p><p>he was supposed to be fine. </p><p>he looks over at dream, just from the corner of his eye. </p><p>he doesn’t see a manipulator? but he assumes that’s just because he’s seeing dream in rose-tinted glasses or whatever sam and puffy said. </p><p>he can’t. </p><p>he looks over at dream, properly this time. he looks so pitiful. he isn’t even wearing his mask. he isn’t facing tommy. his hair’s grown out a little, and it’s a little dirty. the little of his face tommy can see is horribly scarred. it’s almost a little sickening to look at. </p><p>dream doesn’t look at him. </p><p>dream doesn’t look at him. </p><p>and he looks at dream. </p><p>he sits there. he sits there in the corner of the room?? cell? and he sits. </p><p>the room is too silent. </p><p>the room is far too silent. </p><p>tommy tries to hum just a little bit but the noise echoes around him. the noise echoes HORRIBLY. horribly. the noise echoes in a horrible horrible song and it feels far too loud, far, far too loud. </p><p>he sits quietly, and even in the silence, his breath feels far too loud. </p><p>he sits. </p><p>and the silence sits with him. the silence is mocking him, it’s surrounding him, it’s laughing at him and his suffering and it’s laughing. </p><p>it laughs in the silence and it’s laughter is somehow quieter than the surroundings. </p><p>he tries to focus on the lava bubbling. it’s crackling fills the silence but it doesn’t feel right. it’s like a hole. a hole in his soul or whatever bullshit people would use to explain his emotions. </p><p>he sits and he listens to lava and he feels empty. empty unlike anything he’s felt before. he isn’t full of anger for dream, for being trapped. he isn’t scared. he isn’t anything. </p><p>he isn’t anything at all. he’s empty. empty like the night sky, black and shining full of mocking, mocking stars. </p><p>mocking, mocking stars. shining in the awful void. </p><p>he is empty. and he sits. and the silence laughs. and the lava crackles. and dream faces away. he doesn’t even acknowledge tommy. </p><p>he sits there in his silly, silly orange jumpsuit and he looks straight out of a crime movie or some shit. he doesn’t look at tommy. he’s looking at the water? his back to the chest. and he’s looking at the water. </p><p>tommy’s never seen dream’s face behind that mask. he looks in dream’s eyes and immediately looks away. they’re piercing green, green so bright it hurts a little. his nose is crooked, and it looks broken, and tommy wonders what he did to get that. his cheek is scarred up, and the wounds look old. his mouth is thinly-set and he looks almost remorseful. words echo in his mind, echoing, telling him dream cannot be trusted, dream is a horrible person, dream is a murderer, dream is the one he’s been fighting all along. </p><p>the message doesn’t fully sink in. not when dream finally meets his eye, and tommy sees the other eye, a massive slash through his eye, and the iris white and glossed over, like he can’t see out of it. like he’s blinded. </p><p>dream looks over at him and his eyes are so pitiful, and so horribly sorry. they look almost teary.</p><p>they look like an apology. </p><p>and tommy looks at him, and he can’t tell what his eyes say. but dream knows. dream knows. </p><p>dream knows. </p><p>dream always knows. </p><p>and tommy doesn’t. </p><p>tommy is blind, and dream is all-seeing. </p><p>dream guides him into the dark, and he only guides him into further depths. but the blind cannot tell the dark from the darker. </p><p>and so he follows.</p><p>dream doesn’t speak. but at least he’s looking at him now. at least he’s looking. </p><p>at least he’s here. </p><p>at least he’s not alone. </p><p>at least he’s not alone. </p><p>he’s not alone.</p><p>dream’s here, at least. </p><p>yeah. dream’s here. </p><p>right?</p><p>he’ll be fine. he’ll be fine. it’s just a week. </p><p>and dream isn’t that bad. he’s powerless. he doesn’t have armour, or weapons, or potions, or the discs or anything he can use against tommy. </p><p>he’s the one in power. yeah. he’s in power. </p><p>he’s in power. </p><p>tommy smiles to himself. he’s in charge here. he’s gonna be just fine. </p><p>dream doesn’t speak, and tommy goes to sleep and he knows he’s in charge. he’s gonna be just fine. absolutely fine. </p><p>he thinks. </p><p>he hopes. </p><p>as he sleeps, he dreams of explosions. one after the other. the first l’manberg war, then wilbur and then he hears his things, his armour, his weapons, everything he knows and owns, all blown up in front of him. and then he hears the explosions from earlier, the ones trapping him in here. </p><p>except he isn’t trapped, is he? </p><p>he’s fine! he’s absolutely fine! he’s the one in power here! </p><p>his dreams twist into a smile and they reassure him. he’s gonna be absolutely fine! this is actually amazing for him! </p><p>his dreams smile some more, and then they are gone. and he is awake. </p><p>dream stands over him, and tommy looks in his eyes. it’s funny to be able to actually see them. dream smiles at him, just as his dreams smiled at him. </p><p>isn’t that funny? </p><p>dream passes him a potato, and tommy gladly eats it. it only fills his stomach a little, but it’s something. </p><p>dream still doesn’t speak, but tommy does. </p><p>he speaks very fast and about a lot of things and dream listens. dream listens to him! he’s glad to be listened to. </p><p>if he keeps talking, and dream keeps listening, maybe he can forget that he’s in this prison. maybe it’ll feel like old times! before l’manberg, before things got complicated, before people got complicated. it was normal before. maybe it can be normal again. </p><p>he can be normal!</p><p>and dream can be normal and not whatever he was doing. </p><p>mhm. he’s doing great. </p><p>dream speaks, and now tommy listens. he talks about prison. </p><p>he speaks, and he says he is lonely. he is very lonely. </p><p>he only sees sam, and he only sees him occasionally. and tommy feels pity. dream sighs. and he says he’s sorry, he’s sorry for exile and he didn’t realise and he’s so, so sorry because he hurt tommy and he didn’t even realise what he was doing, he didn’t understand what tommy was feeling and now he understands. because he is lonely. he’s sorry. </p><p>he’s sorry. and tommy smiles. because he’s sorry! he’s really sorry! he’s alone and afraid and so was tommy and now he understands! he knows. he knows. he knows how it was. and tommy smiles and dream smiles and the silence smiles. and the prison smiles and everyone smiles because everything’s right. </p><p>nothing was wrong in the first place. </p><p>dream is nice to him! dream is his friend! dream hasn’t done anything super bad. he’s not that bad. he’s his friend. </p><p>dream’s his friend!</p><p>mhm! </p><p>dream’s sorry!! and he’s nice!!</p><p>he talks a little more, and tommy listens because dream listened to tommy and then tommy talks and dream listens to him because he’s his friend! </p><p>tommy talks about his hotel, and dream asks about it. dream asks if he can stay at hotel when it’s open and tommy says yes because dream’s his friend! of course his friends can stay at the hotel! dream can stay there, and- </p><p>does he have any other friends?</p><p>tubbo was? was he? didn’t tubbo exile him? wasn’t it tubbo? </p><p>tubbo hadn’t apologised. </p><p>but dream had. </p><p>yeah! dream had! </p><p>dream’s his only friend but he’s still a friend! </p><p>they talk, and the silence no longer mocks him and neither do the stars. </p><p>it’s fine. </p><p>tommy’s fine. </p><p>he and dream talk and they eat potatoes and dream shows tommy books, things he’s written. </p><p>tommy tries his hand at writing too. he doesn’t write much. he was never any good at writing. </p><p>he sleeps. </p><p>his dreams are now blank and dark, like a cave or a mine. or maybe even a ravine. a singular lantern lights, and shows the truth of the dark. it’s stone, ragged stone, studded with button after button after button and tommy stands there, facing him.</p><p>wilbur faces him, a thin, twisted smile on his face, trenchcoat blowing back in the wind. his eyes aren’t the brown they were in life, they were fire. pure fire and hell in an iris, dancing and flickering. </p><p>wilbur looks him in the eye, and he speaks in a voice so painfully close to his wilbur, to the man he’d followed to revolution, and yet so broken, so horribly broken, hanging on to sanity by a thread.</p><p>he speaks. </p><p>“it was never meant to be.” </p><p>he hits a button, and the ravine collapses in a mad flurry of explosions. but above the boom of tnt and the crash of rock, all tommy’s can hear is wilbur’s mad laughter, cackling, yelling, the final note in a damned symphony, damned from the second it started. </p><p>and tommy wakes up, screaming. </p><p>and dream is sat beside him, leaning over him, his face twisted in concern. he asks what happened softly. his voice is quiet, so very quiet, like snowfall. it’s comforting. tommy’s heavy breaths become even, if a little ragged. “nightmare.” he explains, and sighs. </p><p>he hates those dreams. they got so bad after pogtopia, he barely slept, just to avoid them. in exile, it was even worse. and now, it makes sense they’re back, creeping into his weak points, making him vulnerable. he’s lucky dream’s here to help calm him down. </p><p>he’s very lucky he’s not alone. </p><p>he’s very lucky indeed. </p><p>he doesn’t sleep after that. he doesn’t want the risk. </p><p>the obsidian cries. why does it cry? it drips its horrible sticky purple goo onto him in its sadness. he’s taken to an old memory, where a man, with longer blond hair, and wings, soft wings, called it grieving obsidian. and when tommy asked who it was mourning, the winged man got a faraway look in his eyes, and said he didn’t know. even as a child, tommy knew he was lying. </p><p>he didn’t remember the man, he was too young when he knew him, and the man left him far too quickly.</p><p>dream passes tommy a potato, and he eats it quietly. he’s never liked potatoes. </p><p>time passes. tommy doesn’t know how long, there’s no clock. time passes. a week passes. he sees sam. well, he hears him from across the lava. he’s apologising. why is he apologising? </p><p>tommy is still completely fine. in fact, he might be better! he’s got his only friend back, and the cell might be boring but he’s fine! he’s good!</p><p>sam tells him he has to stay in the cell for a little longer and tommy replies cheerily. and when sam leaves, potatoes go down the shoot. </p><p>tommy reaches out and grabs one, and before he’s about to eat it, dream suddenly sounds very serious, and his voice becomes scary, “what’re you doing?”. he’s confused and says he’s eating and dream seems angry. </p><p>dream’s eyes darken, and it shakes tommy to the core. he grabs tommy’s shoulder, and holds out his hand. </p><p>“hand over the potato.” </p><p>confusion flashes in tommy’s eyes and he utters out a quiet, “what?”. to which dream repeats his order. whether tommy’s just stubborn, stupid or the request didn’t register in his head, he didn’t know. </p><p>he knows he’s being hit, hard, pain stinging across his face, forcing his  eye shut, his nose dripping with blood, and he falls over, and in a mad scramble to find his feet, his head hits the obsidian, and his vision goes black. </p><p>his vision isn’t black for long. he opens his eyes, and he’s back in that nightmare ravine, the stony walls now terribly real, and when he reaches to touch them, they’re cold. the buttons are all real too, and he doesn’t dare hit them, just in case. and he hears that horrible voice, the broken voice of wilbur soot, the smiling, mocking voice, that echoes around the ravine. </p><p>he hears it say hello tommy. and when he spins around you see where wilbur is, he’s right in front of him where only empty space was before. </p><p>wilbur looks just like he did in life, except for the gaping wound, still bleeding, the blood bright blue, bright, bright blue. and tommy’s sure if he reaches up to the back of his head, where a headache is pulsing, he’ll find the same blue blood leaking out his head. </p><p>wilbur speaks again. </p><p>“i’d welcome you formally but, you aren’t meant to be here, are you?”</p><p>and tommy’s eyes open, open to see the obsidian ceiling, crying, weeping.</p><p>grieving.</p><p>why is he alive? </p><p>why is he here? </p><p>surely he died? he saw wilbur, he-</p><p>he looks over at dream, who is holding a book. the revival book. surely not, surely not- surely. he had to have used it. he had brought tommy back from the dead? how? why? dream snaps his fingers, and the book disappears into thin air, and he looks over at tommy with a smile. </p><p>“oh good, you’re awake!” dream goes and crouched beside where tommy is lying, lying in the slightly  damp rock, exhausted, unable to sit up or move even slightly. tommy looks at dream, and he looks into the warm smile that feels like home. </p><p>dream starts to talk again and tommy can’t do anything but listen. </p><p>“i’m sorry it came to that. </p><p>i didn't want to kill you but sometimes you have to. </p><p>i only did it because i care about you though. i do everything because i care for you. </p><p>you probably won’t understand, you’re too young, by the one day, you’ll see it from my point of view.”</p><p>and tommy probably wouldn’t understand. he would one day though. he nodded, and dream continued. </p><p>“it’s just because i care about you. </p><p>no one loves you like i do, tommy.” </p><p>and when tommy thinks, he can’t disprove it. no one’s ever cared about tommy. wilbur blew up l’manberg, techno set the withers on him, tubbo exiled him. no one cares about him. </p><p>except, of course, dream. </p><p>dream cared. dream had brought him back to life, and maybe he’d killed him in the first place but tommy hadn’t listened to him. it was really tommy’s fault, wasn’t it?</p><p>he is let out a few days later. </p><p>well, ‘let out’ isn’t really the truth. more like ‘dragged out kicking and screaming’. </p><p>he doesn’t understand why sam  doesn’t want him to stay in there. dream’s his friend, he doesn’t get what sam means when he says he can’t stay. why can’t he stay, he could stay during the security breach. </p><p>and quietly a plan began to tick in tommy’s mind, a smiling little plan. </p><p>he enacts it at night, when everyone was asleep or preoccupied, and sam wouldn’t be around. </p><p>he asks to visit again a week later, and sam accepts, albeit tentatively. </p><p>he goes through all the security, and he puts away his stuff and he’s back in there, in the cell with dream, and he tells dream the plan quietly, under the bubble of the lava. and so tommy pushes a little button. just a little button, hidden in the cell, behind the chest. </p><p>a little button sets off a lot of tnt, a lot of tnt kills a lot of guardians, and blows a big ass hole in the side of pandora’s vault. </p><p>and all the evils in the world escape, laughing, laughing as they run off into the sunset, and far from anywhere mapped on the server, that’s for sure. </p><p>and when people next see the evils, they are masked, and cloaked. one in green, and one in red, a perfect opposing pair, masked with mocking smiles.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. and suddenly, it fit.</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>heyo i made it multiple chapters </p><p>chapter name from eight by sleeping at last. i like that song :]</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>villains all die at the end. </p><p>slain by the hero, left bleeding out, their crimes unforgivable, their name slandered, their memory tainted. </p><p>wilbur soot begs his father to kill him, to free him, to become the hero and kill the villain and live happily ever after. he knows it doesn’t work that way but in his mania, he believes it will. </p><p>that his death will solve everything. </p><p>but he lies there, on the stone floor of the button room, the sunlight shining in at him, and he touches the wound, wincing at the pain. </p><p>bleeding out takes longer than you’d think. especially just with a slash through the stomach. </p><p>he lies there, smiling to himself. </p><p>this is the end isn’t it? this is happily ever after? this is the good end, where everyone lives and he’s the only real casualty. this is the good ending. </p><p>this is the right ending. </p><p>he’s dying, the pain in his stomach almost too much to bear. and he shuts his eyes, only for a moment, just to distract from the ache, from the sticky blood, from the ringing in his ears. </p><p>it only took that small blinking to close his eyes forever, to give in to the soft embrace of death. it only takes an eternity and then some to die, but when he is dead, he finds himself wishing for one more second, one more good second. </p><p>one more second in the sun, one more second building l’manberg, one more second laughing and having fun, one more second with his son. one more second of the good life he used to lead. </p><p>a life so easily ended. a life so easily derailed. it’s laughable how fragile life is. </p><p>so wilbur laughs. he laughs and he laughs and he laughs in this echoing void, reverberating his laughter back at him over and over, and he only laughs more, laughing until he can’t anymore, and all he can hear is the void’s poor imitation of him. </p><p>he names the void the after. he’s heard stories of the end, a mythical land through a portal, like the nether but so much more strange, the homeland of endermen and a great dark dragon. it’s just a myth, but wilbur thinks if that’s the end, then this must be the after. </p><p>the after is empty and lonesome. so he plays solitaire. solitaire is a solo game, of course. he doesn’t have anyone to play with. he becomes very good at solitaire, but it’s a simple game.</p><p>he knows that no matter how good he becomes though he’ll never be able to win some games. fail decks are just guaranteed losses. he wonders if l’manberg was a fail deck, or if he just messed up somewhere. </p><p>he plays more solitaire, and tries to forget.</p><p>forget the weight on his shoulders, the heavy coat substituting the weight of the world. he rakes a hand through his hair although there is no one around. force of habit. </p><p>he thinks about greek myths. thinks about atlas, cursed to hold the world. thinks about sisyphus, cursed to roll his stone, cursed for his pride, cursed to be so close to victory, and yet, the stone rolls away. </p><p>wilbur turns over a card, and realises he will not win this game. so he lays out another. this game also ends out as a fail. and he restarts. perhaps this is insanity, he thinks.</p><p>doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. he thinks he read somewhere, heard through someone, picked it up from somewhere. but then again, he’s also been told the first sign of insanity is little red hairs on your palms, and the second sign is looking for them. </p><p>he sighs. and he doesn’t play solitaire for a little. but he returns. he always does. </p><p>there’s nothing else to do. </p><p>he thinks about sisyphus again. why didn’t he just leave the rock? in some stories he’s chained to it, but he’s strong enough to push the rock up a mountain, surely he’s strong enough to push it away? he supposes it’s just human stubbornness. a refusal to back down is a blessing and a curse. wilbur doesn’t have the gift. he knew surrender well. </p><p>tommy didn’t. </p><p>which is why he’s so surprised when tommy falls into the after. </p><p>and then the after is given shape. </p><p>it becomes pogtopia, and wilbur can feel an all too familiar pain in his chest, as he sees this poor broken boy, tears in his eyes, his face filthy, his nose and mouth bloody and a black eye to boot. some death he had. </p><p>and when tommy sees him, he freezes up, and all wilbur hears in the silence is a little drip drop, drip drop, drip drop, a deafening fall of blood from the newly opened wound under wilbur’s shirt. it was closed before tommy got there. </p><p>tommy looks at him in horror, looks at his filthy coat, his greasy ass hair he didn’t bother to wash in his last living days, the bloodstained shirt, the gaping wound that aches so softly it could almost not be there. and tommy is scared. </p><p>he is broken, and bruised. and some part of wilbur is laughing, laughing at this poor, broken child, this beaten rag of a person, with an oddly bent leg and a puffy, squinting eye, and part of him cries for this boy he’s seen die twice and is watching the aftermath of the third, this part of him weeps, weeps for tommy and for himself and for l’manberg and for every little thing he has lost and for every great thing too.</p><p>wilbur doesn’t like that part of himself. he much prefers the laughter. </p><p>he speaks, and so does the sadistic part of his brain. “hello tommy.” </p><p>he takes a pause, as the boy stares at him more, and he smiles, “i’d welcome you here formally but you aren’t meant to be here, are you?” </p><p>his own words echo back at him, two sets, two mirroring sets of words echo back, as tommy’s after fades, and wilbur’s after returns. and with it returns solitude. </p><p>and with solitude returns solitaire, and with solitaire returns fail decks. </p><p>things really are never meant to be with wilbur, are they? </p><p>he returns to his games, and to his sisyphean task. over and over, he tries to win a game. but he can’t. can’t win a single game. it’s all luck of the draw, and luck has never loved wilbur soot. </p><p>the after doesn’t love wilbur either. it’s a world of mind games, of figures you see out the corner of your eye and then when you look properly, they are gone, of a sound like tv static, so the silence is not quite true. </p><p>wilbur doesn’t like the after. he doesn’t like it one bit. tears fall from his eyes, and when he wipes them away, his hand is sooty. he hasnt properly washed in years. in the after, his state when he died is perfectly preserved, and that includes the ringing in his ears, and the ache in his bones, the grime layering his skin, and the heavy, heavy weight on his shoulders. he cries, and no one hears. </p><p>if a tree falls, and no one is around to hear it fall, does it ever really fall at all?</p><p>the after takes back their cards, and wilbur is given a scene instead to endlessly play around with, to watch over and over, and change slightly. </p><p>it’s when he blows up l’manberg, of course. when else would the universe torture him with? </p><p>he watches it as tommy, stands behind him, hears as he screams, screams a horrible deafening scream, over all the noise, hears his own twisted laughter, sobbing and cackling at once, and he watches from afar as phil stabs him, and the scar in his chest aches. </p><p>he moves his model people, and whispers different lines at them, reads them a different script. </p><p>in script one, phil refuses to kill him. and the model of wilbur takes his own life. the wound aches. </p><p>in script two, they fail at the very start. they do not take back manberg, and they are publicly executed. real wilbur winces as fake wilbur is beheaded. there is no blood in the plays he puts on. it’s just a performance, after all, </p><p>in the last script, phil begs wilbur to stop the madness, and to remove the button and to come home, and the fake wilbur is swayed by his father’s words. he takes the extended hand, and he goes home. he doesn’t return to l’manberg, and he doesn’t learn what happens to it. but real wilbur knows that tommy and tubbo rebuild it, and rebuild a better life for themselves. they restore a sense of peace to l’manberg, a sense of honour and history. there is a special area in the museum dedicated to wilbur, and it speaks of him warmly, fondly. fake wilbur lives up in the cold artic, and he is happy with his father and his brother and he doesn’t need to hear about how well his old country is doing to know his youngest brother is doing well too. the wound seems to settle, and it’s soft ache fades. </p><p>it’s almost like he’s won the game. life isn’t a game, but perhaps death can be. </p><p>there is a respawn button when wilbur closes his eyes. and he clicks it. </p><p>anyone would. </p><p>he opens his eyes to two smiling masks. they grin down at his newly warm body, and when wilbur sits up, he gets a better look at them. they’re both tall, but shorter than him. the one cloaked in red is shorter than the one cloaked in a more familiar green. </p><p>the green one was very familiar, and it was only the change of outfit that threw wilbur off. he was sure dream only owned one outfit, given he never changed it. maybe he owned several copies of that hoodie, like a cartoon character or something. </p><p>the red one however. it was like there was something looming over him, something great and awful, swirling in the corners of his mind. corruption taking root. he, wilbur took a little longer to place. but the blond hair and the familiar scar, the scar on his sword hand that no one but wilbur would notice, made him realise who was staring at him. </p><p>he laughs, and it echoes properly. he is surrounded by things, so many wonderful things, so many horrible things. </p><p>he is cloaked in yellow, and he jokes they’re a traffic light. he too gets a mask and he assumes it’s just their brand, but when he puts on the mask, it makes his vision brighter, sharper, and he feels like he’s finally gotten the right glasses prescription. dream says it’s also to hide their identities. people are not so fond of tommy after he broke dream out, and wilbur is supposed to be dead. </p><p>tommy doesn’t speak very much. it’s unsettling. it makes wilbur uneasy, when he only gets a cold one, two word answer at best. but he doesn’t let it get him down, he’s just been revived, he needs to live. </p><p>he picks up guitar again. doesn’t know where or how dream found a guitar, especially while they’re on the run. he just knows that he’s playing it again. he’s sloppy from lack of practice but his muscle memory doesn’t fail. it’s a good way to keep himself busy. </p><p>he goes caving. dream and tommy are both uneasy around small spaces, and wilbur doesn’t mind going and mining for a bit. it keeps him busy. anything to keep busy.</p><p>he’s strolling through a vein when he spots diamonds. finally. he goes towards it when he hears the telltale hiss of a creeper. aw shit. he switches to his axe, and prepares to hit the mob and bolt before it can explode but, to his surprise, the creeper approaches him, it’s hissing somehow soft? almost like a cat’s purr. </p><p>of course, he’s incredibly terrified and freaking out a little, considering a creeper is fucking purring. he’s never heard a creeper purr before, he’s never been this close to one in survival. he mines the diamonds and gets back to the surface as quickly as possible. </p><p>dream’s at their little makeshift shack in a cliff, and he notices how shaken wilbur is. so he asks. </p><p>“went mining,” he throws the diamonds at dream and smelts the iron, just so he doesn’t forget later, “there was a creeper right. it fucking went straight up to me and started purring? it didn’t explode at all?”. </p><p>dream looks puzzled, and he looks out the door’s window. it’s night. “let’s see if it works again.”.</p><p>and so he is dragged, protesting heavily, by dream to find a creeper just to satisfy his curiosity. despite his adamant yelling that hey!! maybe deliberately trying to blow yourself up is a bad idea!! dream doesn’t stop walking towards a creeper in the distance.</p><p>the green scaly creature is just within earshot when dream drives behind a bush and alarmed by the noise, it notices wilbur. and just like before, it waddles up to him, hissing softly. wilbur holds his sword out but the mob doesn’t show any signs of exploding. he hears dream yell from the bush, and apparently so does the creeper because it charged straight for him. in a second, wilbur jumps to stand inbetween the mob and dream, and he screws his eyes shut, praying to god this would work.</p><p>when he opens an eye tentatively, the creeper is docile again. it looks at him with big, black, shiny eyes, and for a second he thinks it looks kind of cute. dream pops out from behind him, and the creeper lets out a warning hiss, to which wilbur replies in a weird hissing language he instinctively knows, “hey, he’s a friend.”. apparently the creeper understands him, because it nods and waddles off. </p><p>dream is looking at him in awe, and wilbur is completely in shock. creepers understand and listen to him. he can talk to creepers. what the fuck. a smile plays at dream’s lips and he begins to speak, </p><p>“dude, you could get us infinite gunpowder! oh my god, that’s insane, you can talk to creepers. talk in creeper?” he rambles on and wilbur isn’t listening. what the fuck just happened. how did he know creeper? that’s not a language any players know. that’s definitely not a learnable language. he definitely didn’t know that before? </p><p>he sits down, and head in hands, he thinks. what caused that? creepers definitely attacked him before he died, right? he hadn’t seen one since he’d been revived until today. was it to do with revival? is it because he’d died? </p><p>apparently, he’d been rambling aloud because dream responds, “dude, you’re a genius. that’s gotta be it.” and then he says something that chills wilbur to the bone. </p><p>“you’ve become a god.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>maybe you can tell i went a little wild w the worldbuilding for this au?? aha. i like magic aus very much :] </p><p>i’m calling this au the sleepwalkers au bc. dream ahahaha i’m amazing ik ik.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. it feels like i’m sinking when i’m standing in one place.</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>AY!! </p><p>shorter chapter. but i changed my whole plot for this. bc i was rewatching the exile vods and just. yknow. </p><p>chapter title from seven by sleeping at last.</p>
          </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>tommy is not jealous. </p><p>tommy isn’t jealous when wilbur and dream wake him up, and wilbur’s eyes are green, not brown, not red like when he died, wilbur’s eyes are green and bright. tommy isn’t jealous when they explain wilbur has some kind of magic, and dream suggests his theory that it’s based on revival, and maybe the excess magic of the revival made wilbur magic or some dumb shit, some dumb fucking kids show shit except with revived corpses. </p><p>tommy isn’t jealous when wilbur goes off again, not to mine, like he does at 2am when he thinks no one’s awake and he thinks he’s being sneaky (he’s not, the oaken floor creaks with every step he takes), but to test out these stupid new powers he’s got. </p><p>he’s not even special. </p><p>it wasn’t wilbur who broke dream out of prison. </p><p>it wasn’t wilbur who dug out his old, musty corpse. it wasn’t wilbur who tore off all the vines, who held his breath for fear the smell of decay and rot and blood would make him throw up, it wasn’t wilbur who laid out that old body, rotten and eaten by bugs and tommy didn’t want to think about what else. </p><p>wilbur was just the stupid body. rotting away like a pussy. he wouldn’t rot if he was a corpse</p><p>it was tommy who watched as dream began muttering, muttering in an ancient language, as the air around him began to crackle, and tommy watched as the great gash in wilbur’s chest was covered with fresh skin, as dried blood flowed once more, as rotten skin became new and clean, as the colour returned to his skin, as rigor mortis left his bones. </p><p>and when wilbur’s eyes open, for a split second, tommy swears he saw them flash green, but it could just be his imagination. now he knows. it was the fucking stupid magic he’s got now. the stupid magic that tommy might have too. </p><p>he’s lying awake, and he can hear dream, dream excitedly talking, talking about how wilbur is the key to taking back the dream smp, to being powerful again. </p><p>he’s lying awake, and he takes a leaf out of wilbur’s book. he goes out, and he goes and keeps busy. </p><p>he’s mining wood. he knows that he’s stockpiling resources and it’s probably hoarding and it’s probably unhealthy but! he has to keep busy, and collecting resources is also very useful. tommy needs to be useful. </p><p>why’s he need to be useful? he didn’t need to be useful with tubbo. but then again tubbo exiled him. but dream- dream wasn't his friend in exile. dream had just been watching him. he- </p><p>why did he break dream out? dream’s fucking powerless. he was entirely in control, why’d he do that?</p><p>a sinking feeling of- of guilt? and regret? shook through his bones. </p><p>he ignores it and goes back to collecting wood. he has to be useful, after all. </p><p>he’s gotten just over five stacks when he sees the crow. it’s all black, as all crows are, and it’s feathers have a soft shine. and it’s surprisingly tame, too, when it lands on his hand, tilting its little bird head and peering at him with its bright little eyes. he smiles at it, and it tilts its head the other way. there’s a note attached to its foot and he unties the little green ribbon tethering the bird to it and the little black crow flies off, flies north. a messanger bird.</p><p>the bird becomes a black speck in the clear sky, and then disappears, and his attention is brought back to the note in his hand. </p><p>‘dear tommy’, it reads, and he recognises the handwriting.</p><p> ‘how are you? that sounds really awkward now i’ve written it, but now it’s written and i guess i can’t change it. but i hope you’re okay. </p><p>i don’t know where you’ve gone and no one here does either, but i sent one of phil’s crows to find you and phil says they always find the person you’re sending the letter to. </p><p>it’s weird hanging around phil and techno, but ranboo said that if anyone can help me find you, it’ll be them. they know about most things that go on around here somehow? probably the birds. there’s way too many of them around here for how cold it is. how aren’t they cold? i sure am. </p><p>if you ever want to, like, come back, i’m staying near techno’s cabin.’ and then, scribbled out, ‘i hope you’ll come back.’. </p><p>‘yours, tubbo’. </p><p>tommy holds it, reading the letter over and over until it’s burnt into his retinas, every misspelling, every shake in tubbo’s handwriting, and he looks to last line, the one he wasn't meant to see. </p><p>tubbo wants him to come back? tubbo wants him back? he thinks about how long it’d be to techno’s cabin, maybe a day or two’s journey. </p><p>would tubbo forgive him? does he forgive tubbo? </p><p>his knuckles go white holding the letter, and his hands feel unreasonably warm. he doesn’t notice the fire licking at the rough parchment until it came closer to the line he wasn’t meant to see. </p><p>a few hundred birds leave their trees as he drops the paper, terrified, and stamps on it to try put out the flames. how the fuck had it just set itself on fire, what the fuck? how did that happen? did- did he do that? </p><p>he tries to focus on the heat in his hand, and he directs it out his fingers. and just as before, a small flickering orange flame lights at his fingertips, and he’s enamoured by the dancing of the flame. when he passes his hand through the fire, and he expects the familiar pain, it only feels like warmth, warmth worming into his skin and through his bones making him feel stronger, and he feels more rested than sleep could ever make him. </p><p>the fire burns out, but the warmth doesn’t. the warmth spreads through him, through his limbs and settles in his chest, and if he was poetic, maybe he would think about the fire as his will or his drive or something. </p><p>he pulls out his compass and it’s pointed north, north the way the crow had been. he smiles, and he looks straight ahead, the camp behind him,  wilbur and dream behind him. fuck, who cares if wilbur’s got those stupid powers, who cares if he can make mobs like him. tommy can make fucking fire, wilbur doesn’t stand a fucking chance. and dream? dream and his last fucking life will burn to a crisp. </p><p>he looks north and he smiles. what’s a day or two’s journey to the biggest man tommyinnit?</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>my irl friend gets no torture anymore i’ll have to make a new fic to make him sad. lol. - wither</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>